Do boycotts work? Should arms sales be stopped? What about supplying weapons to the good guys?
In How Wars End an international expert explains how we can act to bring about peace in an age
of escalating war. In 2003 Jan van Aken almost helped stop a war. But as he was preparing to
go to Baghdad to search for biological weapons he got a message: the US was determined to
avenge 9 11 and wouldn' t wait for UN inspections to take place. The invasion went ahead
and only years later the world discovered that Iraq had had no biological weapons at that
time. From this experience and the many others he has had as a weapons inspector conflict
analyst and activist in How Wars End van Aken shows how conflict resolution really works. From
disinformation and dodgy dossiers to chemical weapons and murderous drones he identifies why
wars start and spiral. And he looks at the alternatives including civil initiatives diplomacy
sanctions and international interventions. Interweaving the latest findings from peace
research with stories and examples from Northern Ireland Serbia South Sudan Afghanistan
Syria Ukraine Israel-Palestine and more How Wars End lays out evidence-based strategies for
moving from violent conflict to ceasefire and from ceasefire to lasting peace. Translated by
Jo Heinrich
